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12.30.2013

Hello again, my friends! The words begin to flow once more, I'm craving the weight of my camera in hand, I am surrounded by wonderful people and continue to find new ones, and I'm devouring books like the literature-seeking monster I am. I also have a list of stuff to do in the New Year and a lot of stuff that was awesome in the past year. A girl can't let herself complain too much.

I suppose I'm here though for my mind has been revolving around the concept of compassion (remember when I said I'd write about that?). For starters, as the idea is incredibly in tune with the suffering we live within, I take the definition to stride very closely beside feelings of kindness and love. Okay.

These things, love and kindness and compassion, I am trying to seek, to cultivate, and to implement in my life and within the lives of others... and to stick to these things there are things that have to be done. There is a beautiful list of necessities for this. We must let ourselves create loving atmospheres. We must breathe together and forgive each other for we all stumble along our paths, blindly perhaps, but movement is a constant. Don't let go of those around you. We want everyone to have the feeling of home, the ability to have food without worry, and the capacity to create and move without restriction. Naturally, yes? We want to believe that everyone is worth talking to - and they are. These cliche reminiscent truths ring with clarity: no one can be left on the ground, and every person is deserving of kindness, appreciation, and comfort. Find ways to help others, or ways to give others the tools they need to stand up on their feet without crutches. One point that I always forget, however, is to not forget my own self. This, which isn't under the title of hedonism but instead may be under the term of self-care, is huge. Love everyone, and do what you can. Learn, always learn, seek, read books, talk to strangers, investigate what's around you, move, move, move, and... or... reach out. Try to discover the answers to problems, to suffering, to the complexities of all the things that throw us around, or don't. Sit. Be. Create. (Or at least try, you know?) But don't forget that compassion begins with the individual and if you cannot be compassionate to your own suffering it will cause great harm to your own self.
I guess what I'm getting at is that it is really easy just to let yourself slip your mind and that is a danger to your own capacity. While I personally enjoy thinking that I put others in front of me, when I let myself forget to cultivate my own well being I become lazy... and when I become lazy I start to do nothing. I forget to read. I forget to write, and I forget to study. I forget that I can walk out the door any day I'd like and somehow impact someone else in a positive way.

Laziness is a common battle. One main cause I personally have found is routine. I end up in the cycle of job, home, sleep, a wondrously uneventful day off... job, home... sleep... job... Well these are all things that have their places, but when they become the only things tunnel vision slips in. Working! Sleeping! Sitting at home! And now I'm sad! All there is, or so it may feel like in time. You've got to remember to get out. If you feel like the couch and you were meant to be - get up, and go outside. Even if you just walk around the block, go do it. Or go downtown and see what's out there. A new person will probably talk to you or you'll talk to them and something interesting might happen. I know it's all the same stuff we're fed all of the time and that hearing it once more may not inspire - but, the next time you catch yourself falling in to apathy, just stand up and see what happens. Force yourself at least a few times. If you sort of have a kind of interest in an instrument or a sport or a skill just go learn it. Find a new cool place. The routine then breaks and your mind begins to peek its sleepy head through the walls you've set. And yeah, it sounds stupid and simple, but sometimes just doing something different than usual wakes you up and just brings light to you once again.

Once again this is something I've read countless times throughout the scrawls of spiritual books and in the words from friends, but once it hits you it's one of the best lessons you'll ever learn: the second thing I find that gets me down is resisting emotion. Happiness is a thing to flourish within, but, man, when those days get rough, it's hard to find peace within anything at all. In the midst of unhappiness the mind consistently will flirt with the idea of being in a more positive state than the present. This resistance extends the negativity. If you are sad, stop and let it be. Put down your phone, your laptop, your book, or whatever it may be and just sit for a few minutes. You're sad, that is simply how it is, and it may pass, but for now that is that. Sit in it, look at it, perhaps you'll come to understand it, but don't imagine you're something other than you are. Cease the distractions for a little while and truly stare in to the face of whatever is plaguing you. Once you stop fighting against storms you will no longer be as battered by them.

Thanks for reading until the end. It felt like a rant I must say; my apologies for a lack of coherency or the tendency to
ramble upon simple things. Now, I'm off to enjoy the evening.